seasons of simplicity
by Chocolate Pencil
Summary: The way they used to be. Yahiko x Konan


**seasons of simplicity**

_By Chocolate Pencil_

**A/N:** Random word generator gave me the three words seashell, sting, and simplicity and the ever awesome **Flipspring** gave me the characters Konan and Yahiko (and Nagato, but I'm afraid he's not mentioned much). So here you go. This is re-uploaded after I deleted it the first time I published it. Why? 'Cause the original version sucked. So if you think this is bad, that's okay, because the first one sucked **more.**

**Dedicated to:** _**Flipspring**_, because she's cool and I was supposed to write this a long time ago.

**Warnings:** Spoilers for chapters 508-509, long sentences, and it might not follow canon exactly.

**Disclaimer:** I own only this story. The poem/thing in the beginning is an English nursery rhyme, and Naruto belongs to Masashi Kishimoto.

/

_**Rain, rain, go away. Come again another day.**_

/

(_Why won't it stop? Why won't the sun break through the clouds? It's like the clouds are a heavy metal cover between brightness and darkness, she's stuck in the dark and she can't get out, and above all there's the miserable rain, it fills the air with its scent and it pours down until she can't feel anything resembling hope_.)

It's raining and Konan should be used to it, but this rain is harder than usual and she's dripping wet and cold; lost and far from home. She just wants the sun to shine once, pretty please, just once in her whole entire life. Raindrops are gathering on every inch of her bare skin and soaking her clothes through and through. She feels like a soggy paper doll, the kind she and her sister make- no, it's made now, because everyone's dead, everyone's _dead_ and she'll never make a paper doll with her big sister again, ever ever ever.

Bodies on the floor and blood like rain and rivers, the lights above her head flickering out. It's a horrible memory, imprinted in her mind, and Konan can't forget it, and she wishes the rain could wash it away and cleanse her, fresh and new, but all it does is spread it and nothing is there to dry is up.

Konan throws up, and after a few minutes of trudging through the rainstorm, she collapses on the ground, half in exhaustion and half wanting it to all end.

/

In the morning, pale light wakes her up, weak and watery. It's only drizzling now, nothing like the storm last night, and the water clings to her like bad thoughts. Konan's surprised that she's still alive. Chilled to the core and starving, yes, but alive.

Something in that- she's alive! - makes her stand up and start walking again, even though she has no idea where she's going. There's only a vague thought that she has to get away from the battle, away from the chaos.

Really, Konan's just a quiet girl who wanted a peaceful life spent with her family making paper dolls and dreaming about the sun, but that can't be real or possible anymore.

Because the war came.

The war came, and some things can't be reversed.

She feels like throwing up again, but she has to keep whatever food she has left in her stomach or else she's going to die from hunger. Her stomach hurts more than anything, except maybe her heart. There had been many food shortages since the first few Suna and Konoha shinobi stepped foot into Amegakure, even though Amegakure had nothing to do with the dispute between the two countries. Most of its food supply comes from The Land of Fire, and they have been too preoccupied with Suna to bother with supplying the small country whose ground is forever too wet to grow anything.

Konan keeps walking, with one foot in front of another in a march, eyes trained on the ground. A dull glint captures her attention, ivory white on wet brown dirt, and she hesitantly picks it up to see what it is. It's smooth and feels almost like glass.

Maybe it's food? It's almost too much to hope for, but you never know.

A small hole breaks the creamy smoothness of the object and Konan discovers it fits perfectly over her ear. The quiet _whoosh-whoosh_ lulls her, like the gentle moments of the waves in the water-filled area outside her room. It brings back the memories of warm sheets and cold toes and giggling as her sister tells her a silly, made up story.

It's a nice sound, but Konan can't ignore the panging of her empty stomach. Tentatively, she raises the possibly edible object to her mouth and begins to bite on it.

"Hey!" a voice shouts, interrupting her before she can eat. A boy, around her age, runs over to her and snatches her food away.

"You can't eat that! It's mine, and I was looking for it. Besides, you can't eat seashells! Don't you know that?"

Konan flushes. "S-sorry. I didn't know," she mumbles. The boy studies her with furrowed brows and flashes her a wide grin.

"It's fine. Are you hungry?"

It's a stupid question, of course she's hungry, all of Amegakure is hungry, but she answers his question with a nod all the same.

The boy digs around in his little bag while Konan stares at him. His hair's not like anything she's seen before, it's a golden yellow, so bright, like the sun she's never seen before. Konan wants to reach out and touch it to see if it gives out warmth, like the fire that is equally as scarce as food in Ame.

"Here you go! I had extra," the yellow haired boy says, handing her a piece of bread. He's probably lying and was saving this piece for when the hunger forces you to stop thinking about anything else but the hunger and it's so unbearable you think you're going to die, and normally Konan would decline but it's been almost four days and her stomach hurts, it hurts so bad, so Konan takes it and eats it in three swift bites.

"Thank you," she murmurs when she's done. It was surprising that he was so kind. Normally, people in Amegakure have hollow faces beaten by rain and try to keep whatever little possessions they have on them, and they don't share. It's not a matter of rudeness or selfishness, it's so bad in Ame that only the strongest can survive, the ones with food and fire and a place to live; the top dogs, the fighters.

"No problem!" the boy exclaims. "I'm Yahiko. What's your name?"

"Konan," she replies.

'Well then, Konan, do you wanna come with me? I'll make sure to never let you go hungry again!" Yahiko grins again, a big grin where his eyes crinkle up. Yes or no? It's a simple answer, and Konan pauses only a little before smiling back as a yes.

Turns out, Yahiko has been living in a cave nearby for the past few weeks. It's certainly not like her old home, but it's dry and hopefully safe. He shows her the stash of food he has hidden in his blankets, and the sight of it makes Konan almost deliriously happy, more cheerful than she's been in days.

Yahiko is a cheerful child. There's a determined air surrounding him, and Konan's not really sure why he has it. She herself is just trying to live and trying to forget, but he's set on conquering the fear and pain through what, she also doesn't know, but when he grins and assures her that things will be fine, she believes him, partly because she can't do anything else and partly because she _does_.

Maybe with sun-haired Yahiko, things _will _turn out okay.

/

On the seventh day, reality hits in.

Konan is folding paper into anything; birds, flowers, animals, when the sharp edge of a piece of paper slices across her skin. Her first thought is "ouch" and to stop the stinging, because it hurts like needles, and then, she sees the blood. The _blood_, all over her fingers, the paper, the walls and she starts _screaming_.

Because it's just like that day, the day with blood on her sister's pale skin and on the floor around her, nasty wounds and blood trailing everywhere and her parents slumped on the table, glassy eyed and dead, leaving Konan the only one living in the house of crimson horror. Why did the Suna nin choose her house to hide in, when the lights were on and the voices apparent, and why did the Konoha nin jump in and kill everyone, everyone except her?

Everyone is dead. She is the only one alive.

She can't stop screaming, and she's crying now too, tears wet like the rain she _hates_, the rain she _abhors_ with a passion. Her throat aches but she only stops the screaming when she feels warm arms around her, reminding her she is not the only one left.

"I'm here. I'll protect you," Yahiko whispers, and she believes that with all her heart. She clings to him and sobs.

It still stings. But she's alive, and so is Yahiko, and things are going to be okay with him here. She doesn't understand why she feels this, after all, she just met him, but he is the sun and she's the flower that follows his warm smiles and comforting hugs. Yahiko is Yahiko and there's no reason why.

Yahiko doesn't ask what she's crying about because there is no need, and Konan doesn't thanks him because he already knows.

/

After a while, the food starts to run out, and Yahiko decides to go back to Amegakure to get some more. For some strange, irrational reason, Konan begs him to stay.

"I have to go, Konan, or else we'll starve! And I promised I wouldn't let you go hungry," Yahiko reminds her. Konan nods, suppressing the tears looming on the edges of her eyes. She forces a smile for Yahiko and watches him fade into the distance.

(_She doesn't want him to die._)

To keep her mind off him, she folds until there are only her fingers and the paper melding together to make a bouquet of roses, a flock of cranes. It's amazing, really, how a few simple folds and creases can make the most beautiful creations. It's almost like her and Yahiko. The days go by relatively in the same way, rain and stories and explorations outside, but Konan loves the same feel it has, the simple ways one can spend a day. Every day is spend doing the same yet not, but as long as Yahiko's here everything is fine.

(_Yahiko comes home fully intact and with a new supply of food, and Konan greets him an uncharacteristically large hug._)

Later, Yahiko asks her to teach her how to make something, because "origami is cool and I want to learn!" Konan smiles and shows him how to make a crane, step by step, much slower than her usual lightning fingered speed, and he copies her even more slowly. When everything is done, there are two paper cranes. One is lopsided and messy winged, quite unlike the precise, pointed shape of the other.

"Wow! That was pretty easy!" Yahiko says when all is done. "I mean, all you had to do was a few little steps, but it ends up looking super nice! 'Cept I'm kinda bad at this stuff. You're really good, Konan!" He grins just like the day they met, and Konan smiles back without hesitating a bit.

/

Everything changes when Jiraiya asks Yahiko, Nagato, and her to be his students. Konan wants to say no, but Yahiko has that determined look in his eyes and they both know there's no point arguing with him.

Konan wants things to stay the way they are, however miserable the situation is- food's getting harder and harder to find, and their stomachs growl at night- because they're together and she doesn't want them to become a shinobi. Shinobi fight in wars.

People die in wars.

But Yahiko says, "I promised both of you that I would protect you, and I'm going to keep my promise!" And what can Konan do? He is the sun.

(_Flowers bloom toward the sun._)

She follows the two, not knowing the simplicity of her life is going the other way.

/

The vile _maggot_ of a man stands in front of her, and Konan can barely say his name; it's a curse, one that has followed her for far too long.

He manipulated Nagato, he tells her, used Nagato's and Yahiko's beliefs against him and used them to bend Nagato to his will. He spits in the face of Yahiko and Nagato, her everything, but they were each their own person, _how dare he_. She can't say any more though, because her throat feels dry and flaky and the words can't make their way out. She's used her jutsus and even if she had the ultimate card, her chakra is all drained away.

Konan doesn't want to give up. No, she wants to fight and yell and _tear _this man to pieces, little shredded paper pieces with blood staining the whiteness. Because if it's true (_it can't be, do you understand? It can't be true_) then he's the reason they died, he's the reason Yahiko started this mad quest to make the world better.

When Yahiko died, she didn't understand what was happening. Well, she understood, but she didn't _understand_. Suddenly he was in the enemy's hands and Nagato was forced to make that horrible decision between two precious things, and if it had been Konan she would have gotten Yahiko back, no matter what, but he said no and a knife came and there was blood, _so much blood_, and Yahiko was not breathing anymore. She isn't sure if she cried or not, it felt like it, all she remembers is that it was wet and Yahiko was _dead_.

Nagato died too, after Yahiko, but he died all the same, and Konan is sure she didn't cry, but crying doesn't make a difference. She was never as close to Nagato like she was to Yahiko, Nagato didn't have the same quality that Yahiko possessed, the liveliness and the heart, but he was her friend, and she misses him. It's still like the world is gone, every day, and in a way, it is.

(_Everyone is dead. She is the only one alive._ _Except, how long will she have to live?_)

Silently, she wishes she could go back and change Yahiko's mind. If only they hadn't met Jiraiya, if only Yahiko wasn't so set In his goals that he wasn't able to see the truth: Konan didn't mind if she went hungry or if he didn't protect her. As long as he was there, she would have been fine, perfectly fine with the empty stomach and crying and the rain.

The horrid man is starting his killing blow, and her last thought is a wistful one, almost a wish- that she would wake up and it would be all a dream and Yahiko would hug her tight; that the simplicity of her life would come back and then she'd smile.

She hasn't done that for a long time.

(_The clouds clear up and the sun finally comes out and shines after she dies, a few minutes too late, but that's alright, because Konan found her sun a long time ago._)


End file.
